Indian Farmer who could not afford a tractor, converts Royal Enfield motorcycle into a ploughing machine

Farmers in India generally use bullocks for ploughing their land, and if they are well off, they use tractors. But there are some farmers who are unable to afford none and as they say necessity is the mother of all inventions, a Gujarati farmer, Mansukh Jagani has converted a Royal Enfield Bullet motorcycle into a ploughing machine.

Christened as Bullet ‘Santi’, meaning Bullet Ploughing, Mr Jagani developed the ploughing motorcycle back in 1994. In 1993, Mr Jagani’s village named Mota Devaliya in Amreli District, Gujarat faced drought, because of which he was forced to sell the pair of bullocks he owned. “There was no point in going back to bullocks as they had become extremely expensive due to lack of water and fodder in a drought year,” adds Mr Jagani.

This is what led to Bullet Santi. Mr Jagani, who is a school drop-out, had seen motorcycles in his village which were modified as rickshaws for transportation. He applied the same logic behind Santi, replaced the rear wheel with two smaller wheels and attached a detachable instrument which enables the motorcycle to plough land when needed and when not needed, the same instrument can be removed and used like a normal motorcycle.

Talking about the advantages of Santi, Mr Jagani says, “Bullet Santi cuts down expenses by over 40 per cent. Moreover, you have to feed bullocks through the year whether they can be used in farming or not. Bullet Santi, on the other hand, drinks fuel only when used.”

After almost two decades, the situation today is such that, Mr Jagani owns a workshop where he builds modifies Bullet Motorcycles in Bullet Santi. Everday hundreds of farmers in Saurashtra, Gujarat start their Bullet Santi and plough an acre of land within half an hour and utilizing just 1 liters of diesel. Mr Jagani says, “Till now, I have made 500 such devices and there are more than 500 people who are making it. It can sow 20 bighas of land using one litre of diesel for every four bighas (1 acre). There is no other alternative given the benefits you get.”

Bullet Santi has been granted patent in the US. Jaganis motorbike-polycultivator bagged a national award at NIFs first National Competition for Grassroots Innovations and Traditional Knowledge in 2001. According to official website of Bullet Santi;

Salient features:

Easy to assemble and disassemble, therefore the motorcycle can be used for transportation after completing farm operations.

Field capacity (coverage) of the machine is 4 acres/hr (1.8 ha/hr) for groundnut cultivation. However, it may vary for different crops depending upon the soil conditions and cropping pattern.

The unit is capable of performing all the agricultural operation carried out by pairs of bullock and subset of operations performed by tractor.

Can also be used for goods transporting operations by attaching a small trailer.

Fuel consumption of the machine is 1 lit/hr for groundnut cultivation.